What is Market Research?

Market research is the process of exploring, collecting, and assessing information about a particular market environment to identify whether the product or service you’re offering is viable to meet the needs and wants of a group of customers.

A market research tool is a software application that allows you to study market trends, study your competitors, collect customer insights and feedback about your product or service.

The good news is, we’re here to help you take advantage of the online market research tools available so that you can find and reach a variety of people on a grander scale.

But before we get into which market research tools you need to make the launch of your business a sweet success, let’s see why it’s necessary to do it in the first place.

Why is Market Research Necessary?

Whether you're a start-up or you're one of the top dogs in the online business world, market research lays a solid foundation for your business to grow by helping you to:

• Identify new customers
• Understand your current customer base
• Reduce risk and make informed decisions
• Assess the competition
• Find growth opportunities
• Create on point advertising

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Type of Market Research Techniques

Qualitative Research

Qualitative research is the kind of market research you do to determine why your customer thinks or operates a certain way (the feelings behind a decision).

For example, in a focus group or interview, you’d ask open-ended questions like:

• Why did you buy my product or service?
• What do you like about the product or service and why?

Quantitative Research

It’s all about the numbers and percentages here. Qualitative research is conducted using polls and surveys.

The information you look for could be:

• Social media followers
• Website visits
• Social media engagement, etc.

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Our Top Picks: 10 Market Research Tools to Use

Now that we’ve set the foundation, let’s get into the real reason you’re here.

And in no particular order, here are the top 10 market research tools you can use from today:

1. Survey Monkey

If you’re looking to do quality qualitative research, Survey Monkey is your go-to tool. With a user-friendly interface and easy navigation, you can tap into the power of creating quick surveys that can get you all the info you need.

You get to enjoy advanced customised surveys, run online opinion polls, and conduct detailed qualitative research.

Don’t worry if you don’t know how to construct your survey. It comes pre-packaged with many pre-built survey templates and nifty features that help speed up the entire process.

2. Statista

Say hello to numbers and statistics made easy. Statista is an online statistical data analysis portal that collates market data from over 600 industries. And! The service is made available to 50 countries, so you get data perspective on a global scale.

It’s straightforward:

You visit the site.
Type in any relevant topic or keyword you want to see stats on.
Receive the search results in easy to understand blue-coloured data charts.

Suppose you’re searching for reliable results to get you market research data for consumer behaviour, market trends, demographics, and consumer opinions. In that case, this is the online spot where you can find it.

3. Google Trends

How do people find what they’re looking for online? That’s correct, using words.

And that’s precisely what Google Trends does. It’s a keyword research tool that provides in-depth information into what people around the globe are searching for.

You can segment the results according to region, time, and even search network type to make it even more valuable and specific to you.

With Google Trends, you can:

• Do comparative keyword research.
• Do research across multiple search networks like image, YouTube, and Google Shopping.
• Analyse market trends and areas of high customer interest.
• Conduct easy competition analysis.

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4. Think with Google

Think with Google is a one-stop-shop claimed by Google for understanding industry trends, consumer behaviour, marketing insight, etc.

It's a free-to-use curated resource library of facts and figures using Google's bountiful array of analytics data, along with human wisdom, to provide information you might not find from other sources.

5. Typeform

There’s a better way to ask, and that’s with Typeform.

This online research tool constructs surveys (customised to your brand image) in an engaging, meaningful, and stimulating way. With an intuitive and simple user interface, you can also get detailed analytics and reporting features and view real-time survey responses.

BONUS: You get live online training and easy integration with over 500 business apps.

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6. BrandMentions

BrandMentions is one of the most effective ways to monitor your brand or product on the internet.

You get access to everything that is being said about your brand, product and industry to help you make faster, better, and wiser decisions.

The features are:

• Social mention - a simple to use social media search tool that aggregates user-generated content from across the internet into a single stream of information.
• Hashtag tracker - is used to track hashtags accurately. Good hashtag monitoring tools allow you to see which hashtags a social media audience uses and how they're performing.
• Brand tracker - a marketing activity tool that measures the impact of brand campaigns on awareness and sales. It pulls through results from various sources such as blogs, news outlets, and social media.
• Social media tracker - monitors a brands' online conversations. You can listen to what people say about brands on social media, blogs, and media.

7. Answer the Public

Answer the Public is a market research tool that provides insight by combining the suggested searches from Bing and Google and visualises them in a search cloud.

“It’s a goldmine of consumer insight you can use to create fresh, ultra-useful content, products, and services.” – Answerthepublic.com

If you’re wondering what kind of questions your desired customers could ask, then Answer the Public is one of the best keyword research tools to help you find those answers.

Why you should use Answer the Public:

• You get to know your audience and understand what motivates them.
• You can optimise for long-tail key phrases.
• You’re able to answer questions that can get you into Google’s featured snippets.

8. Crayon

Crayon rings the alarm bells when your competitor makes the slightest move.

This tool uses artificial intelligence to track a business’s online activity while supplying you with critical insights into its strategy, products, and marketing.

Crayon improves competitive intelligence efforts by providing:

• Organised data that you can prioritise, categorise, sort and filter.
• Weekly custom reports that highlight trends and compiles data.
• Collaborative features that you can send and share insights with your team through PDFs.
• Analytics reports that benchmark you against competitors.

9. Tableau

Tableau helps people see and understand data. This visual analytics platform transforms how people use data to solve problems.

Tableau’s built-in data connections and preparation tools enable you to access data quickly, giving you time to do what’s important – analyse the results, and formulate the insights.

Its easy-to-use interface allows you to swiftly add different dimensions and measures, filter out group values, and zoom into outliers.

10. Loop11

Loop 11 is an online usability testing tool that allows you to create an online survey that includes tasks for users to complete on any smart device, wherever they are.

The tool allows you to set real-world tasks and measure the success of your product against real customer intent. You can collect insights from hundreds of users or just a few: it’s entirely up to you.

A few of many key benefits of using Loop11:

• You don’t need to be a UX professional to use it.
• Participants don’t need to download the software.
• You can test with an international audience.

You've Got the Power!

On a serious note, three cheers for you for reaching the finish line. Don’t waste any time. Go ahead and start digging for those data golden nuggets that’ll set you up for success.

This article is part of our Hitchhiker's Guide to Making Money Online.

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